432 Squirrels of B, America, 



All our American species of this genus, as far as we Lave been 

 able to become acquainted with their habits, build their nests 

 either in the fork of a tree, or on some secure portion of its branch- 

 es. The nest is hemispherical in shape, and is composed of 

 sticks, leaves, the bark of trees, and various kinds of mosses and 

 lichens. In the vicinity of these nests, however, they have a still 

 more secure retreat in some hollow tree, to which they retire in 

 cold or in very wet weather, and where their first litter of young 

 is generally produced. 



Several species of squirrels collect and hide away food during 

 the abundant season of autumn, to serve as a winter store. This 

 hoard is composed of various kinds of walnuts and hickory nuts, 

 chesnuts, chinquepins, acorns, corn, &c., which may be found in 

 their vicinity. The species, however, that inhabit the Southern 

 portions of the United States, where the ground is seldom covered 

 with snow, and where they can always derive a precarious support 

 from the seeds, insects, and worms, which they scratch up among 

 the leaves, &c., are less provident in this respect ; and of all our 

 species, the chickaree, or Hudson's Bay squirrel (Sc. Hudsonius) 

 is by far the most industrious, and lays up the greatest quantity 



of food. 



In the spring, the squirrels shed their hair, which is replaced 

 bv a thinner and less furry coat ; during summer their tails are 

 narrower and less feathery than in autumn, when they either re- 

 ceive an entirely new coat, or a very great accession of fur ; at 

 this season also, the outer surfaces of the ears are more thickly 

 and prominently clothed with fur than in the spring and summer. 



Squirrels are notorious depredators on the Indian corn fields of 

 the farmer, in some portions of our country, consuming great 

 quantities of this grain, and by tearing ofl" the husks, exposing an 

 immense number of the unripe ears to the mouldering influence 

 of the dew and rain. 



The usual note emitted by this genus is a kind of tremulous 

 querulous bark, not very unlike the quacking of a duck. Although 

 all our larger squirrels have shades of difi"erence in their notes, 

 which will enable the practised ear to designate the species even 

 before they are seen, yet this difl'erence cannot easily be described 

 by words. Their bark seems to be the repetition of a syllable five 

 or six times, quack-quack-quack-quack-qua — commencing low, 

 gradually raising to a higher pitch, and ending with a drawl on 

 the last letter in the syllable. The notes, however, of the smaller 



